


to sweet beginnings and (bitter) endings

by anthropologicalhands



Category: Crazy Ex-Girlfriend (TV)
Genre: A little angst, F/M, Fluff, Pre-Canon, Summer Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-27
Updated: 2018-03-27
Packaged: 2019-04-13 13:37:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,225
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14113500
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anthropologicalhands/pseuds/anthropologicalhands
Summary: Josh Chan expects his second year of summer camp to be much like the first. But then there’s Rebecca. Pre-series.





	to sweet beginnings and (bitter) endings

It’s like this:

Josh goes to Camp Canyon Grove for the second summer in a row, sixteen and single. Valencia’s angry that he chose camp again instead of spending the summer with her, so they are on the outs again, which kind of sucks, because when they are on the outs, _everyone_ knows they are on the outs and he’s glad to be at theater camp, away from all that drama.

He spends the first few hours getting his stuff sorted and meeting his cabinmates, who are all pretty cool themselves. One of them, Sean Takahashi, was at camp the year before, and has all the gossip on their old friends. They catch up, Sean listening sympathetically when Josh fills him in on the fallout with Valencia.

“Don’t worry about it, Josh,” he says, clapping him on the back. “Plenty of cute girls here.”

Josh smiles and nods and says, “Sounds good,” but nothing else. After all, cute girls are nice, but it’s not like he’s looking for a new girlfriend.

They have orientation and that’s familiar, all the drama teachers are the same as last year, including Mrs. Webster in her polka dot skirt. They go over safety and general rules, including the same strict warnings about sneaking into cabins after hours, complete with skits, and Josh already feels at ease. Things will be like normal.

Mrs. Webster wraps out the presentation by describing the musical they will be performing and before she can even ask for questions, someone’s hand shoots straight up into the air.

“Are we including the songs from the revival or will we be doing a faithful reproduction of the original 1949 run?”

Josh is sitting on the opposite side of the room and has to stretch his neck up to get a better view of the speaker. She’s new –a white girl with thick brown hair tied back and freckles across her nose, and she keeps bouncing in her seat, like she would be doing cartwheels if she could.

He doesn’t catch Mrs. Webster’s answer, which is a little involved, but the girl is nodding, so the answer must be something good.

A few more questions later, everyone is filing out of the theater and Josh finds himself next to her as they are jostled through the doors. She’s talking very fast and enthusiastically to the girl next to her about the history of the musical Mrs. Webster mentioned, but then she abruptly turns to him, switching topics halfway through her sentence.

“You’re Josh Chan, right?” she asks, blue eyes fixing right on him and rooting him to the spot. Her conversation partner slips quickly away.

“That’s me,” he says, one hand coming up to rub the back of his head. “What’s up?”

Her eyes don’t waver, and narrow. “I heard the other girls talking about you.”

“Oh?” He tries not to squirm. Girls tend to like him, which is great, it’s flattering, but sometimes it leads to really weird misunderstandings. “Only good things, right?” he jokes.

“Yep.” She smiles suddenly, and she no longer looks so fierce but warm and cheerful and pretty. “Word in the cabins is, that you’re a really good dancer.”

“Oh really?” He perks up, the knot in his stomach easing. “I mean, yeah, I know a few moves.”

“So I hear,” says the girl again. She’s wearing one of the camp nametags slapped haphazardly over her Harry Potter shirt and Josh squints at it –Rebecca Bunch is scrawled across it.

Rebecca is still talking. “I also hear that you’re a cool guy, and everyone seems to like you, so I thought it would be good to meet you.”

“Oh! Thanks. I hope they didn’t talk me up too much—I’d hate to disappoint anyone.”

He’s a little embarrassed to hear that other people are talking about him, but Rebecca relays it all with such warmth, he can’t believe that she’s being anything but genuine.

“You’re already really nice,” says Rebecca. “So, you’ve already exceeded expectations, and I bet you’re a good dancer too. I hope I get to see it.”

“You definitely will,” says Josh. “Find me some music and I’ll show you.”

“Awesome!” Rebecca’s smile, if possible, widens further. “This is great—everyone here has already been way nicer than home, and I can’t wait to see what everyone can do. I wasn’t sure what to think about what would happen after I got here, I kind of got tricked by the weather already –I had to buy a bunch of hoodies from the airport, I thought it would be hotter in California and my mom started getting vapors and ranting about me looking like a hobo from San Francisco— _also_ , sorry, I might be babbling. I’m from New York and we needs to save our breath there, so we talk really fast, and my mom is super competitive so she talks even faster, and I kind of picked it up even though I didn’t want to—if you met my mother, you’d get it. Not that you’d meet my mother, except, actually, you might. She’s coming on parents’ weekend, which is kind of amazing, because she really hates airplanes, but you know what, it’ll be great.”

She says it all very fast. Josh struggles a bit, blinking hard as he absorbs all of the information. She’s watching him, lower lip between her teeth and her face is kind of red, like she’s embarrassed.

He hopes he didn’t make her feel bad.

“You’re from New York?” he asks, trying to pluck the first bit of personal information that he can safely comment on. “That’s so cool! I’ve never been out of California and it took, like, six hours to drive up here.”

Her eyes light up. “Really? Where are you from?”

“Little place called West Covina, down in SoCal.”

“West Covina,” she says, a little reverently, and Josh already kind of liked her, but that really gets him; most people just roll their eyes or look confused when he mentions his hometown. “Is there a town called just ‘Covina’, then?”

“Yeah, and it’s okay and all, like, it has the biggest movie multiplex in LA, but it’s not as great as West Covina. We’re actually a bigger town than they are.”

She nods, absorbing, still looking at him, seeming to absorb everything he’s saying. He clears his throat. “Where are you from? New York City? I’ve always wanted to go.”

“I wish,” she shakes her head. “I’m from Scarsdale. Don’t ever go there if you can help it. It’s full of terrifying Jewish mothers and the stench of the decaying upper class.”

“Oh,” says Josh, blinking. “That sounds bad.”

“It really is.”

She’s about to say more, but then Sean calls out to him, and he turns to see that they are at the foot of the stairs leading up to the guys’ side of the camp, gesturing at him to hurry up.

When he looks back at Rebecca, she’s no longer looking at him but down at her shoes.

“Sorry, I kind of took up your time,” she laughs self-consciously, her smile no longer glimmering as it had been earlier.

“No way—you weren’t taking up my time,” he says, wanting to reassure her, not to leave her disappointed. “We’re going to talk tomorrow, okay, Rebecca?”

She brightens, the motion electric through her whole body. “You know my name?”

“Yeah, it’s right on your nametag.” He points.

“Oh right,” she laughs again, bright and infectious, smoothing a hand self-consciously over the wrinkled red and white square. “Of course. Totally forgot about that. Well, it was wonderful to meet you, Josh Chan. Until we meet again.”

She does a weird little curtsey, which makes him laugh.

“You bet.” Josh smiles again at her, before turning back and jogging to rejoin his cabinmates. He doesn’t see her looking after him—Sean has to tell him.

“That chick’s still staring. It’s kinda weird.”

When Josh turns around, she’s already vanished. He turns back to Sean.

“Maybe,” he says, shrugging. “But she’s nice. I want to talk to her again.”

\--

They have acting classes and voice classes, and it’s a little intense, but theater kids are a lot of fun, and Josh takes advantages of breaks to show off his breakdancing.

He’s playing frisbee with the guys when Rebecca seeks him out again. She doesn’t join in, just watches from the sidelines, beaming again, visibly impressed.

“You’re amazing.”

“Nah, it’s just in the wrist,” he says. “Wanna try?”

She cocks her head to one side and grins, bounding over to him, somehow getting in front of him so that her hair gets in his face, between his arms.

“Sure! And wow, you’re sweaty.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s ok, I like it.”

Rebecca’s cool like that –she lets him show her a few moves, and they talk a little more, and after frisbee they sit together in the cafeteria, and after the evening activities they sit together by the firepit, talking past curfew, the stars twinkling above them reflected in her eyes, which never leave him.

\--

Being with Rebecca is a total whirlwind. She’s incredibly smart and enthusiastic and really fun to kiss and before Josh knows it they are a couple. She can talk about anything for hours, but she also listens to him intently, the way people back home sometimes don’t, like what he says matters. She thinks it’s amazing how good he is with the younger kids and how he helps out, and never teases him for his regular visits to the chapel

But she has mood swings, especially after auditions and the call sheet goes up, and she misses the lead, though she still throws herself into her role with every bit of enthusiasm she has.

Because they are together, she confides all kinds of things in him. Rebecca takes everything seriously and sometimes it gets _dark_ and he’s not sure if he should be giving her a hug or saying something, anything.

She never seems to hold his missteps against him, at least, but he still feels like a let-down.

She despairs and despises her mother in turns and the only thing he really knows about her dad is that he got her to camp and that his nickname is the Westchester Sperm Machine and that…says a lot.

It makes him uncomfortable; he can’t imagine ever speaking about his parents in that way, ever.

Even when he meets Naomi Bunch in person and gets interrogated within an inch of his life about the status of Rebecca’s hymen and okay, he kind of understands a little better, it still unnerves him to hear Rebecca talk so disrespectfully to her parents.

As summer goes on, he gets a little homesick. He finds himself thinking of Valencia more and more, who might be bossy and overbearing, but he’s known her since forever—he knows what to say with her, to turn a frown into a smile reliably, without fail.

At the end of the summer, he ends things. Sure, it was fun, but he needs to concentrate on baseball and SATs, they live several states away, and they are different people.

But it’ll be fine, there’s no bad will. They’ll be cool. He’s sure of it.

\--

The next year, he and Valencia are still together when it’s time for camp again, and she’s totally for it this time. She sees him off and kisses him and calls him ‘Joshy’ and makes him promise to call her every day.

On the drive up, Josh finds himself wondering if Rebecca will be there. His mom still won’t let him to get a Facebook account, and he lost her address the day after camp ended, when his cargo shorts were dumped in the washing machine. He knows she called the house a couple of times, while he was out with the guys, but she never left a number for him.

He thinks they should still be cool, even if they aren’t going to get back together. They can be friends.

Sean’s there again, still with all the latest gossip. He asks Sean if he’s heard anything about Rebecca while they unpack, sorting flashlights and bug spray and a few things that will definitely be confiscated if the counselors find them.

“The dramatic New York chick?” Sean scratches at his chin –he’s trying to grow a beard, though it’s only coming in patches; still, Josh is a little envious. He hasn’t even bothered to try. “Nah. Not yet. But wouldn’t you be the one who’d know best? You guys were pretty tight last summer.”

“We lost touch,” says Josh defensively.

“Whatever, man.” Sean shrugs and goes back to unpacking.

Apart from Rebecca, most of his other friends from the previous year came back and the musical is _West Side Story_ and promises a lot of dancing, even if he doesn’t have to sing as much.

The summer is busy and between the rush of rehearsals and night calls to Valencia and drinking purloined beer with his cabinmates and getting lost in the surrounding woods, he doesn’t dwell too much on her absence.

But he doesn’t forget her, even if she doesn’t fill his head every moment. Rebecca and her starry smile flash briefly across his mind, from time to time, and makes him smile, and hopes she’s doing well.

**Author's Note:**

> This felt really weird to write. Because I love Josh, and I love Rebecca, and these are two people who would have had a sweet, imperfect teenage romance and should have left it right there. Anyways, just trying to get into Josh's head.


End file.
